US seeks to establish Asian NATO to build hegemony, says China defense official

A Chinese defense official has warned the United States against its years-long efforts to build an Asia-Pacific version of NATO to establish global hegemony.

China's People's Liberation Army (PLA)'s Jing Jianfeng said Saturday the US Indo-Pacific strategy is to build "an Asia-Pacific version of NATO."

Jing, who is deputy chief of the Joint Staff Department of China's Central Military Commission, described US efforts as the "greatest challenge to regional peace and stability."

He said to establish US global hegemony, the Americans would make every effort "to create division, provoke confrontation and undermine stability."

Jing pointed out that Washington's Indo-Pacific strategy, devised to serve America’s "selfish" interests, is now outdated and fails to take into account the stability and aspirations of regional countries.

"It only serves the selfish geopolitical interests of the US and runs counter to the trend of history and the shared aspirations of regional countries for peace, development and win-win cooperation," Jing said.

Pentagon chief Lloyd Austin, who was speaking at the annual three-day Shangri-La Dialogue security summit in Singapore on Saturday, hailed the new era of security.

He said Washington would maintain its presence in the Indo-Pacific region by forging military alliances with regional countries.

There has been a "new convergence around nearly all aspects of security" in the Asia-Pacific, where there was a shared understanding 

The Pentagon chief met with his Chinese counterpart, Dong Jun, on Friday in a bid to cool new friction building between the two countries.

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Dong emphasized that the Chinese side firmly condemned the serious violations by the Americans breaching their international commitments, sending the wrong signals to "Taiwan independence" separatist forces.

The Chinese defense minister also emphasized Beijing’s demand that the United States should not support "Taiwan independence" by providing military aid to Taipei in any shape.

The meeting was the first substantive face-to-face talks between the two countries' defense ministers in 18 months.

Beijing had cut its military-to-military communications with the United States in 2022 in response to then-US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan.

The tensions between the two countries were further stoked by issues including an alleged Chinese spy balloon that was shot down over US airspace, a meeting between Taiwan's then-president Tsai Ing-wen and Pelosi's successor Kevin McCarthy, and American military aid for Chinese Taipei.

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